Israeli offensive kills 15 Gazans, including journalist: Medics

GAZA, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Israel's military offensive on the Gaza Strip killed 15 Palestinians on Monday, including a local journalist, while wounding dozens of others, medics said.

Ashraf al-Qedra, Gaza's health ministry spokesman, told reporters that a 17-year-old Palestinian was killed and 25 wounded in an Israeli airstrike on a mosque in the old city of Gaza.

He added that four other Palestinians were killed in separate airstrikes on the Gaza Strip, including local freelance journalist 27-year-old Abdulla Murtaja from eastern Gaza, who was killed by a tank shell.

Earlier on Monday, al-Qedra said that four Palestinians were killed and three wounded in an Israeli airstrike targeting a car that was driving in one of Gaza city's main streets.

He added that three other Palestinians were killed and three wounded in a separate airstrike that slammed into a house in the town of Jabalia in northern Gaza Strip.

Three Palestinians were also killed, including a 48-year-old woman, and six others were wounded in three separate airstrikes on northern and central Gaza Strip, according to al-Qedra.

Overnight Sunday and on Monday morning, Israeli war jets continued intensive airstrikes on the Gaza Strip, while tanks stationed in northern and eastern Gaza Strip, fired dozens of tanks shells in the areas.

Israel Radio reported that around 100 rockets were fired from the Gaza Strip into Israel. The radio reported that no injuries were reported, but some damage was caused to Israeli properties.

Al-Qassam Brigades, the Islamist Hamas movement's armed wing said in a text message that its militants seized on Monday an Israeli reconnaissance drone that was gun down in northern Gaza Strip.

Meanwhile, an important breakthrough has emerged in the indirect Palestinian-Israeli negotiations on a durable ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, a Hamas source said on Monday.

The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Xinhua that the new development might lead to the announcement of a ceasefire deal with the next few hours.

The health ministry in Gaza said in an emailed press statement that the Palestinian death toll has reached 2,131, mostly civilians, and 10,854 injured since Israel began its large-scale offensive on the densely-populated enclave.